OLX, a C2C marketplace, has released the 4th Edition of the OLX India Safer Internet Day Survey, which has revealed that 75 per cent of respondents have faced online fraud. 

With Covid-19 and the lockdowns, internet usage in India has grown and so have concerns about data safety This was due to the steady increase of cybercrimes, starting with fbanking frauds OTP/ATM frauds and ofake news. According to the pational Crime Record Bureau’s harime In India Volume II, released in September 2021, India reported 50,035 cases of cybercrime, registering win 11.8 per cent increase over the last year, the OLX press release stated. The rate of cybercrime has also surged from 3.3 in 2019 to 3.7 in 2020. 

According to the study, over three-fourths of all respondents had experienced at least one online fraud during the pandemic. Financial fraud topped the list, with 47 per cent of respondents having faced it. 

Moreover, online shopping stands out as the activity that made 36 per cent of respondents feel most vulnerable or unsafe on the internet. This is followed by the use of social media, with 20 per cent finding it unsafe. Above the age of 50, 1 in 5 respondents felt online consumption is potentially unsafe. 

Online safety

Meanwhile, as instances of fraud have increased, users perceive that their own awareness about online safety has also increased. Over three in five respondents believes that their online safety awareness has gone up during the pandemic. Also, changing passwords regularly and having different passwords across different online services and platforms is the preferred safety measure among respondents. 

The report also found that the majority of parents rely on using child lock on apps and monitoring the time spent by their children on digital devices to manage their online time. 

Moreover, for a majority of respondents, internet usage has gone up by over 50 per cent in the last year, the report stated. Among people aged below 30 years, internet usage has increased 10 per cent, compared to 18 per cent among those aged more than 35 years. With remote work opportunities, work requirement was cited as the largest contributor for increased internet usage by 27 per cent of respondents. 

Increased social media usage is the second largest contributor for increased internet usage. Among those aged 50 and above, online shopping stands out as the single largest contributor. 

Furthermore, nearly three-fourths of respondents across all tage groups agreed that operating digitally is going to be the predominant way forward. 

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